Scranton Manufacturing looks to stay on target with its building expansion project later this year.

Earlier this month, the Greene County Board Supervisors agreed to be the fiscal entity for a grant through the Community Development Block Grant with Midwest Partnership and Region XII Council of Governments.

Executive Director Chad Schreck with Midwest Partnership says this grant is through the Iowa Economic Development Authority and is specifically designed for economic growth and job creation.  He talks about some of the details with the grant.

“Scranton’s (Manufacturing) project, creates 50 jobs that meet the job-wage requirements and we can go up to $5,000 per job.  So, we’re looking at a $250,000 grant.  IEDA has told us that its a very strong project and especially when you’re looking at a small community like Scranton and you’re adding 75 total jobs, it scores very favorably with them.”

Schreck adds that if they are awarded this grant, then it would cover 10% of the $2.5 million total expansion project that includes 56,000 square-feet to be added on to their existing location in Scranton along with building a retention pond.

He notes that they wanted to go through the County Supervisors instead of the City of Scranton for this grant for administrative purposes and how the Supervisors meet on a weekly basis compared to the Scranton City Council that only meets once a month.

Even though they were denied a watershed improvement grant through the Iowa Department of Natural Resources, Schreck believes that they will get this grant because they can’t start the project unless it is approved by the IEDA.